Lackmann Food Service: rooting for the home team

WOODBURY, N.Y.-- Thomas F. Lackmann, president and founder of Lackmann Food Service, has at least 100 stories he tells his employees. Out of the stories spring often-repeated inspirational catch phrases that characterize the company's spirit of unity, promise and service.

First, everyone is a "team member," not an employee. There's also, "When you're green, you're growing," the motto of the company's Emerald Leadership Program, which is designed to improve managerial skills. And everyone subscribes to the C.A.R.E. program, which stands for "customers and crew (meaning you) always rate extra."

Lackmann is amused that only recently other companies have caught on to the positive results of empowerment and total quality management that he has relied on for decades.

"When the staff reaches out, that's when you build your business," he says.

And Lackmann ought to know. His 28-year-old Woodbury, N.Y.-based regional contract feeder will bring in $53 million in revenues this year.

"We should have done more," he explains. "That's only $2.3 million in new business during the most current fiscal year, which ends June 30."

But coming off of his previous fiscal year, Lackmann is not complaining. From July 1, 1991, to June 30, 1992, the privately held company recorded its greatest growth since its founding in 1965--$17 million in new business. The accomplishment garnered Tom Lackmann one of the International Foodservice Manufacturer's Association's coveted Silver Plate awards.

Although Lackmann intends to keep the company regional-- except for a growing number of Florida accounts -- he aims for 15-percent growth annually.

"We need to grow to $100 to $120 million through client support and team members," he remarks.

The company now has 41 accounts, which translates into 93 foodservice locations, or "profit centers" in Lackmannese.

About 60 percent of the accounts are business and industry, including clients like Banker's Trust, The New York Stock Exchange and Liz Claiborne. About 35 percent are colleges and universities, including Hofstra University and Post College, both on Long Island. And 5 percent are yacht and country clubs.

During peak times of the year, Lackmann has 1,450 employees. The number falls to 1,200 during the summer, when colleges are out.

Lackmann pinpoints the start of his company's growth to 1979, when a consultant helped him develop the company motto "Lackmann loves to serve you."

With this mantra and a reinforced focus on service, Lackmann set about stealing away both accounts and employees from contract feeding's big players, like ARA Services and Marriott Management Services. And by running efficient operations and treating both clients and employees with respect, he keeps them.

"Tom has an uncanny retention rate with both people and clients," according to Ed Wang, the company's director of marketing and special products. "That's not too common in the corporate world. Tom Lackmann is by far one of the most unique people I've met. He's service-oriented to the point of being fanatical."

Wang, one of the 30 team members at the Woodbury headquarters, has also worked for both Marriott and Westin hotels but prefers his current employer.

"Obviously, there are pros and cons at both, but the benefit here is you do have a lot more leeway to be creative," he explains. "You're really an entrepreneur.

"Also, it's a fairly flat company," he continues. "There are not a lot of extreme layers of managers. I report to Tom, and I'm only a director and the vice presidents do, too. And that's another thing -- it's Tom. Nobody calls him Mr. Lackmann."

The $4 million foodservice account at the Wall Street financial firm Dean Witter exemplifies both Lackmann's service-oriented philosophy and the autonomy he gives his staff.

Each day the 80 employees there prepare nearly 4,000 meals for about 3,500 Dean Witter employees who inhabit 31 floors of Two World Trade Center and five floors in Five World Trade Center.

The team's autonomy helps them with the task's decided ups and downs.

"Traders are the nicest group when the market is doing well," says Jeff Rosenthal, the account's general manager.

And when it is not, "my worst nightmare is a trader," adds Alfredo Louk, manager of the Traders' foodservice and catering department. "They have all this pressure and may have just lost $3 million, and then I say, 'Just tell me what you need to eat.' "

His 14-member kitchen staff makes 300 box lunches daily, which are sent to three and one-half trading floors between 12:15 p.m. and 12:30 p.m. The lunches, both hot and cold, include such selections as hearty chicken with orzo soup, Texas-style chili over rice with cornbread, Oriental chicken and pasta salad, beef bourguignon and a vast selection of sandwiches.

Louk requires that the traders send him their meal vouchers by 8:30 a.m., so he can accommodate the demanding lot. Late vouchers mean last-priority lunches, which usually generate a call from an apologetic trader who will not forget his stomach again. When the traders are efficient about returning their vouchers, Louk rewards them with a sweet treat, like ice cream, to keep up their blood sugar.

Though he may appear a task master, Louk is familiar to his customers and knows about 90 percent of them personally. Often he gets on the trading floor microphone to ask, "How's lunch?"

One floor below, the 43rd, in what Rosenthal calls "the kitchen with the best view of Manhattan" --a calming uptown view that contradicts the frenetic activity occurring both on the trading floors and in the kitchen -- executive chef Matthew Ranghel oversees the 2,500 meals for Dean Witter's main dining room, the meals prepared for the executive dining rooms on the 61st floor and the satellite kitchen in Five World Trade Center.

Ranghel's background, unlike those of many contract feeding chefs, is in restaurants and not B & I accounts, givinjg him a perspective on food preparation he articulates simply, "I don't like cans."

That bodes well with the promotional sentence found on all Lackmann literature: "The Fresh Approach."

Dean Witter customers are treated to a five-week cycle menu of entrees and a three-week cycle menu of entree salads and offering from Lackmann's Lighter by Choice menu.

The Lighter by Choice nutritional program was rolled out in September 1991 to provide items that were lower in fat, sodium and cholesterol for the growing number of nutrition-conscious patrons.

On any given day, Dean Witter customers can choose between three entrees representing a variety of nationalities, a Lighter by Choice selection, carvery grill options, an exhibition cooking choice -- like stir-fries to order and the Silver Plate Value Special in honor of the clients and team members who helped gain the award.

In addition, there is a salad bar, sandwich bar and a popular Gourmet Deli to compete with the upscale sandwiches found on the street. The gourmet sandwiches, like the Green Mountain -- a honey-cured turkey and Vermont cheddar with ripe tomatoes, fresh greens and stone-ground mustard on sourdough rye -- sell for $3.99 compared with regular sandwiches, which sell for $2.50 to $3.

The Gourmet Deli and Lighter by Choice are two of several marketing programs unveiled by Lackmann's four-person marketing department in the past few years.

We're a lot more market aggressive, says-marketing director Wang, who's witnessed this change during his past five years with the company.

"There are more customer programs, like Lighter by Choice," he continues. "And I think we've become more value sensitive. At one time, it was just price value, but now we're looking not only at price but faster service, delivery. Tom likes to use the phrase, 'Bigger, better, faster, cheaper.' He encourages managers not to look at their cafes as cafeterias, but to push and look at them as restaurants and retail operations."

Along those lines, many Lackmann accounts are zero-subsidy or break-even. To control costs, team members are cross-trained to perform a variety of functions and avoid the use of temporary employees.

Cross training has allowed Lackmann to minimally shrink its number of employees as clients downsize. Lackmann proudly recalls a related pep talk he delivered to 84 employees at the Pratt & Whitney accounts in Florida the night before the Persian Gulf War started. He knew the defense contractor was going to downsize, and that meant he would have to cut staff as well.

"I was telling people that they should be proud because every plane in the Persian Gulf had a Pratt & Whitney engine," he remembers.

"Pratt & Whitney went from 10,000 to 8,500, and we were supposed to go from 84 to 67," he added. "But I only laid off two because they kept sales up and that's an example of what people can do."

Ironically, Lackmann never wanted to be in foodservice.

"I felt it was difficult, and I wanted to be an architect," he said.

But for Lackmann, who had been living with his aunt and uncle from the age of 11 years old on, a lack of funds ruled out college. Instead, a series of jobs, led to a position as a messenger for American Tobacco. After a tour of duty in Korea, he moved into sales for American Tobacco. Soon after, he and two friends each invested $2,000 into an ice-cream and candy store in Port Jefferson, N.Y. Nine months later they sold it for $42,000.

The experience taught him he could build a business, but shortly thereafter difficulty in getting a bank loan created his resolve never to be in the position of asking for money again. Independently, he grew his retail businesses, and then his suppliers convinced him to go into contract feeding.

His first account was a college account he grabbed from Canteen Corp. "The toughest thing was getting his second account," he says. "It took six years."

Although the company has grown exponentially since then, Lackmann remains grounded and he continues to emphasize customer service and team-member recognition.

"I don't know everybody's name anymore," he says. "But somebody has to."

COPYRIGHT 1993 Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group